“Maybe that was part of his game but he ticks so many of the other boxes.

“He’s got pace, power, balance, distribution and he’s good in the air.

“He can be a bit nonchalant but he is a quality player.

“Gary McAllister was the assistant to Brendan Rodgers at Liverpool and I told him I hope you’re going to come and take Virgil but Brendan didn’t fancy him and didn’t think he was better than what he already had.

“He would’ve cost around £12m – every team watched him regularly but the worry was he was showing it against Scottish players but you could tell he was strong, powerful and a well balanced player.”

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Van Dijk ended up joining Southampton for £13m ($17m) in the summer of 2015.

He required just two full seasons in England to convince Liverpool of his worth, with Jurgen Klopp not sharing the opinion of his predecessor at Anfield.